Friday, October 14, 2011

There is a growing consensus in this country that the continued prohibition on some or all drugs should come to an end. Since we spend about $42 Billion annually related to law enforcement for this prohibition, I would have to agree something must change.If you break it down, states tax and spend an average of $26 Billion and the Fed tax and spends $16 Billion on the war on drugs annually. I dont know about you, but I know a few bridges in New York State that could use some upgrades.

Keep in mind, that's for ALL drugs. Many have suggested starting with just Marijuana to test the shift in enforcement while advancing the rehabilitation efforts throughout the country. That would be a Federal savings of $9Billion annually. But there's more.

Either by state or federally, Marijuana could then be sold openly and taxed. It could also face purity standards since many sources reveal traces of deadly additives. Imagine the pot industry selling a safer product than tobacco?So, couple the savings from a reduced enforcement perspective and add the estimated tax revenue of around $10 Billion from Marijuana alone, and we start to see property taxes level off or even go down. If we saw a decrease in incarceration because the lack of drug prohibition arrests, we'd really be mad about what we spent on the Ulster County jail.Marijuana is already believed to be the nation's number one cash crop, exceeding the combined value of wheat and corn. Pot is also the leading cash crop in at least a dozen states, including California and North Carolina.There is a group of police officers who call themselves Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP). Their mission has the following statement:

We believe that drug prohibition is the true cause of much of the social and personal damage that has historically been attributed to drug use. It is prohibition that makes marijuana worth more than gold, and heroin worth more than uranium – while giving criminals a monopoly over their supply. Driven by the huge profits from this monopoly, criminal gangs bribe and kill each other, law enforcers, and children. Their trade is unregulated and they are, therefore, beyond our control.

History has shown that drug prohibition reduces neither use nor abuse. After a rapist is arrested, there are fewer rapes. After a drug dealer is arrested, however, neither the supply nor the demand for drugs is seriously changed. The arrest merely creates a job opening for an endless stream of drug entrepreneurs who will take huge risks for the sake of the enormous profits created by prohibition. Prohibition costs taxpayers tens of billions of dollars every year, yet 40 years and some 40 million arrests later, drugs are cheaper, more potent and far more widely used than at the beginning of this futile crusade.

LEAP is asking Americans to take such a leap and end this failed war. When asked about the legalization of drugs during an interview in Mexico, Sec Hillary Clinton said: “there is just too much money in it.” What may have been a Freudian Slip, has become the focus of the whole drug trade issue. She holds on to the dismissed notion that legalizing drugs, even just pot, will cause more people to join the party, become addicted and wards of the state. As a non-user and advocate for the end of this prohibition, I have no intention of starting something just because it's legal. Americans who want to smoke, already do. Those who don't want to, wont start. It's too easy to understand that if you already wanted to, you already are.

In 2001, Portuguese leaders took an unlikely gamble: they passed a law that made Portugal the first country to fully decriminalize personal drug use.

For people caught with no more than a ten-day supply of marijuana, heroin, ecstasy, cocaine or anything, there would be no arrests, no prosecutions, no prison sentences. Dealers are still sent to prison, or fined, or both, but, for the past decade, Portugal has treated drug abuse solely as a public-health issue.

That doesn’t mean drugs are legal in Portugal. When caught, people are summoned before an administrative body called the Commission for the Dissuasion of Drug Addiction. Each panel consists of three members—usually a lawyer or a judge, a doctor, and a psychologist or a social worker. The commissioners have three options: recommend treatment, levy a small fine, or do nothing.

In most respects, the law seems to have worked: serious drug use is down significantly, particularly among young people; the burden on the criminal-justice system has eased; the number of people seeking treatment has grown; and the rates of drug-related deaths and cases of infectious diseases have fallen.

So why the resistance here? HEMP

Prohibition of Marijuana is closely related to the fact that hemp is the core of the crop. What industries are afraid of increased utilization of hemp?

Paper Industry

Cotton Industry

Pharmaceutical Industry

Oil Industry

Prison Industry

Corn & Wheat Industry

Tobacco Industry

All of these well established commodities would see drastic change if Marijuana was legalized. Hemp would no-longer be the taboo crop associated with the THC content and the ability to grow, harvest and provide a stronger, cheaper, more efficient product than the current industries scares the hell out of those who control the system.

The advocates for keeping the prohibition on drugs, especially marijuana, are embedded in the list above. Those who would suffer the most are those invested in less efficient manufacturing of products that American's are addicted to. It's that simple. When Sec Clinton slips and mentions there's too much money in it, it's more than just the drug cartels that stand to lose, it's the corporations that donate tons of cash into the political system. Keeping the prohibition is JOB ONE for these industries. American citizens have to step up and make the changes that our national leaders wont.

3 comments:

Anonymous
said...

Organized crime was essentially invented by prohibition and now is thriving on it. Intelligent solutions elude the terminally ignorant masses and until a more powerful intellectual meritocracy renders them irrelevant, we will continue to see what we have witnessed for so many decades already. Who rants against education? There lies your foe.

I am all for it, under one condition. Increase the penalties for being under the influence in situations that can hurt innocent people. The drunks are bad enough and don't learn, I have no want to have to now start dodging people high on weed, coke and god knows what else.

I could care less what you do to yourself and your body, just keep it away from me.